On Sun, 2 Jun 1996, Greg Earle wrote:
quoted 10 lines I am surprised that someone would like ACCELERATOR over ISDN or LIFEFORMS.> > I am surprised that someone would like ACCELERATOR over ISDN or LIFEFORMS.
>
> OK, OK, enough!!! I'm going to settle this once and for all!
>
> If you don't like them all, you're mad :-)
>
> (Anyone who doesn't think "Lifeforms" is brilliant needs to be strapped into
> the backseat of a car cruising randomly around San Francisco, while flaming
> on good E under a beautiful clear night sky and with "Lifeforms" on the deck.
> Only then, young Grasshopper, will you Truly Understand.)
Here's my take on FSOL:
1st exposure was "Calcium" on Excursions In Ambience I. On the strength
of that track I bought "Accelerator". The 1st thing that struck me was
what a shitty sounding CD this is. Grainy and compressed with limited
frequency repsonse, it sounds like it was recorded using 12 bit samplers
and a 4 track. But, there were some cool tracks which have kept it in my
regular rotation to this day.
Next, I heard "Cascade" in the music store, thought "Ok, all sounds the
same, maybe I'll buy it someday". Oops. It took two years for
Astralwerks to repress it. Now I've got it, need to listen to it more.
Then came "Amorphous Androgynous". I found it a bit hard to get past the
blatent byte of Peter Gabriel. I probably don't listen to the disc
enough, just because of that sample.
"Lifeforms", a sprawling 2CD set that meanders all over the place. It's
nice (and innovative) in the way it constantly changes, though it's not
very focused. It took them awhile to perfect the art of going somewhere
muscially... Oh, and there's that damn Tomita sample that I always have
to skip...
"Lifeforms Paths 1-7" is okay, but doesn't really pitch my tent.
"Darshana" remix of Sylvian/Fripp - one of the alltime great remixes,
really. They said they remixed the whole album into this one track , but
it's better than the whole album. I haven't listened to the album
since...
"ISDN" brings back the beat. About fucking time. Brilliant. I was
worried that they had lost it on "Lifeforms".
"Far Out Son Of Long, etc." - thank God for Astralwerks from those of us
that missed it the first time around. Also tracked down "Cow" on EIA4,
which is even better. I love bass.
"Deseo Remixes" - an ok track, but pales next to the GlobComm stuff.
I'm sure there's others that I haven't tracked down, especially the
pre-FSOL stuff. All I've heard from that era is "Stakker Humanoid",
which is hilarious, great " crank up in the car with the windows down &
terrorize the neighborhood with" kind of musick. Where's AA's
"Environments", anyway?
I think FSOL is one of those groups whose entire opus must be considered,
since they can be kind of dodgy on occasion.
Che